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I brightened and gave her a winning smile. “Thanks, little sis.” I knew she hated being called that, but I couldn't help but needle her sometimes. That was my job as big brother, after all.
She rolled her eyes fondly and flipped me off. “Fuck off, big bro.”
Once she got the cake pans filled and in the oven, she turned to me. “How was your day?”
“Fine. Another customer said I should open my own shop.”
“See?”
I shook my head and sighed. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I’ve told you. Startup capital, administrative work, lack of support—”
“You have my support,” she pointed out.
“Besides, is there really room in Pine Bluff for two tattoo shops?”
Lena shrugged. “Of course there is. Why wouldn’t there be?”
I rubbed the back of my neck. “It’s a small town, Lee. How many people could possibly live here who want tattoos often enough to keep me in business?”
Lena leveled a look at me. “Like you’re hurting for clients.”
She had me there. “Maybe,” I said finally. “Maybe one day.”
She nodded and gave me a triumphant grin before going back to making her strawberry filling for the cakes. While she worked, we chatted for a while about nothing in particular. Her day, the tattoos I’d worked on, the art I’d been experimenting with, the upcoming holidays. We were continually dancing around the elephant in the room—our parents.
Until we weren’t anymore. “Mom called,” Lena blurted as she was pulling the hot pans out of the oven.
“Fuck.”
“Yeah. She wanted to know if we’re going there for Thanksgiving, or to Dad’s.”
“Do we have to go anywhere? Can’t you tell her I’m sick or something?”
“It’s over a month away. What am I supposed to tell her?”
“Tell her… I have a long case of norovirus. You definitely don’t want to go around her place with that. It’s too contagious.”
“You want me to spread a rumor that you have norovirus for five weeks? What do you think that would do to my baking business?”
“Hmm, fair. Okay, how about… the flu?”
“Ellis!”
“Okay, fine. Tell her I hurt myself then. I have a bad back from hunching over people’s tattoos all day. Or I broke my hand. Hands. Both of them. And a leg. I can’t walk and I can’t help myself so we can’t leave the house.”
She glared at me.
I held up my hands in surrender and sighed deeply. “Fine. What do you want to do?”
“The same thing we always do. Mom’s for lunch, Dad’s for dinner, home to decompress after. By drinking. Heavily.”
Our parents had been divorced since I was a senior in art school and Lena was a freshman in college. It was something else to go away to college and then come home to a divorced household.
“Have you talked to—”
